Editing Alexander Grothendieck (section)

=== Retirement into reclusion and death ===
In 1991, Grothendieck moved to a new address that he did not share with his previous contacts in the mathematical community.{{sfn|Scharlau|2008}} Very few people visited him afterward.<ref name="Rivka#">{{cite magazine |last=Galchen |first=Rivka |url=https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/05/16/the-mysterious-disappearance-of-a-revolutionary-mathematician |title=The Mysterious Disappearance revolutionary mathematician |magazine=The New Yorker |date=May 9, 2022}}</ref> Local villagers helped sustain him with a more varied diet after he tried to live on a staple of [[Taraxacum|dandelion]] soup.<ref>{{cite book |author=[[John Derbyshire]] |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_hsWNzBvr3oC&pg=PA314 |title=Unknown Quantity: A Real and Imaginary History of Algebra |publisher=National Academies Press |year=2006 |page=314| isbn=9780309164801 }}</ref> At some point, [[Leila Schneps]] and Pierre Lochak located him, then carried on a brief correspondence. Thus they became among "the last members of the mathematical establishment to come into contact with him".<ref>{{cite web |last=Leith |first=Sam |author-link=Sam Leith |title=The Einstein of maths |date=2004-03-20 |url=http://www.spectator.co.uk/features/12036/the-einstein-of-maths/ |work=The Spectator |access-date=2019-12-26 |url-status=dead |archive-date=2016-08-11 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160811200940/http://www.spectator.co.uk/2004/03/the-einstein-of-maths/}}</ref> After his death, it was revealed that he lived alone in a house in [[Lasserre, Ariège]], a small village at the foot of the [[Pyrenees]].<ref>{{cite news |author1=Stéphane Foucart |author2=Philippe Pajot |title=Alexandre Grothendieck, le plus grand mathématicien du XXe siècle, est mort |trans-title=Alexandre Grothendieck, the greatest mathematician of the 20th century, is dead |language=fr |url=http://www.lemonde.fr/disparitions/article/2014/11/14/le-mathematicien-alexandre-grothendieck-est-mort_4523482_3382.html |newspaper=Le Monde |date=14 November 2014}}</ref>

In January 2010, Grothendieck wrote the letter entitled "Déclaration d'intention de non-publication" to [[Luc Illusie]], claiming that all materials published in his absence had been published without his permission. He asked that none of his work be reproduced in whole or in part and that copies of this work be removed from libraries.<ref>{{Cite news|title=Grothendieck's letter|date=2010-02-09|work=Secret Blogging Seminar |url=https://sbseminar.wordpress.com/2010/02/09/grothendiecks-letter|access-date=2017-09-12}}</ref> He characterized a website devoted to his work as "an abomination".<ref>{{cite web |url=http://webusers.imj-prg.fr/~leila.schneps/grothendieckcircle/ |title=Grothendieck Circle |access-date=2015-10-13 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140929144122/http://webusers.imj-prg.fr/~leila.schneps/grothendieckcircle/ |archive-date=29 September 2014 |url-status=live}}</ref> His dictate may have been reversed in 2010.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.math.u-psud.fr/~laszlo/sga4.html |title=Réédition des SGA |access-date=2013-11-12 |url-status=dead |archive-date=29 June 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160629235119/http://www.math.u-psud.fr/~laszlo/sga4.html}}</ref>

In September 2014, almost totally deaf and blind, he asked a neighbour to buy him a revolver so he could kill himself. His neighbour refused to do so.<ref name="Hoad" >Phil Hoad, [https://www.theguardian.com/science/article/2024/aug/31/alexander-grothendieck-huawei-ai-artificial-intelligence ‘He was in mystic delirium’: was this hermit mathematician a forgotten genius whose ideas could transform AI – or a lonely madman?], [[The Guardian]] 31 August 2024</ref> On 13 November 2014, aged 86, Grothendieck died in the hospital of [[Saint-Lizier]]<ref name="Hoad" /> or  [[Saint-Girons, Ariège]].<ref name="Liberation-Douroux-Obit-2014-11-13">{{cite web |url=http://www.liberation.fr/sciences/2014/11/13/alexandre-grothendieck-ou-la-mort-d-un-genie-qui-voulait-se-faire-oublier_1142614 |title=Alexandre Grothendieck, ou la mort d'un génie qui voulait se faire oublier |date=13 November 2014 |work=Libération Sciences |access-date=14 November 2014 |language=fr}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url = http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/11231703/Alexander-Grothendieck-obituary.html |title = Alexander Grothendieck - obituary |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141115004729/http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/11231703/Alexander-Grothendieck-obituary.html |archive-date=15 November 2014 |url-status=dead}}</ref>